


The Walk

by sonofnjobu



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-10-27 21:17:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20767103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonofnjobu/pseuds/sonofnjobu
Summary: Erik requested that he be buried in the ocean and T’Challa complies.But the journey is not over for Erik, who must walk through Death to find his final resting place. Will he come out on the other side? Or will he be cursed to roam in darkness forever?





	1. Chapter 1

Erik pulled the blade from his chest, the tiny serrated edges tearing more flesh as it moved. His final breaths were shallow. The air in his lungs escaped from the wound, never making it out of his gaping mouth. 

T’Challa stood silently, watching his cousin drown in his own blood. As much as it pained him, he did not intervene. This was the one true choice N’Jadaka had ever had in his own fate and he could not take that away from him.

Eventually, Erik’s body went limp, drained and exhausted. His eyes were open, trained towards the Wakandan sunset. T’Challa clenched his jaw and lowered himself to sit next to his cousin. He shook slightly and tears welled up in his eyes as he struggled to find the words no one would hear. He couldn’t leave him like this… alone in death as he was in life.

“Rest now, N’Jadaka. May the ancestors welcome you home.”

The sun had lowered to a dusky purple when the sound of frantic footsteps approached. 

Shuri, flanked by a battalion of Dora Milaje, rushed over to T’Challa, stopping short of Erik’s body.

“Brother…” Shuri gasped, a mix of confusion and relief in her voice. “You are alive! We’ve won!”

T’Challa did not turn to face her. Instantly, his sister knew that something was wrong.

“Are you injured? Did the usurper hurt you?”

“His name was N’Jadaka,” T’Challa pronounced through gritted teeth. Shuri’s face screwed up in confusion as T’Challa rose to his feet. He looked past her and gave the Dora his orders.

“Prepare the royal funerary rituals aboard my ship.”

“Wait, what?” Shuri protested. “He was a murderer! They called him Killmonger for Bast’s sake!”

“Yes,” T’Challa agreed before striding away.

–

Hours later, Erik’s body was wrapped in a sheer shroud, the Black Panther necklace removed, and his father’s necklace in its place. Clay dust was streaked across his forehead and a leaf of a heart shaped herb placed between his lips. The airship hovered silently over the Atlantic at the halfway point of the Middle Passage as they waited for the sun to rise.

Shuri had since grown quiet, having learned of her family’s dark history merely hours before. 

The Dora stood at attention, waiting for the command of their king, and T’Challa stood at the window of the ship, watching the horizon. The first bits of pink had begun to peak above the edge of the world.

“It’s time.”

The small group circled around the body. T’Challa, having just buried his father the week before, took the lead and recited a prayer. Shuri couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud, only bowing her head instead. 

As the pink light became golden, the siblings stepped back, crossed their arms in a final Wakandan salute, and dropped the body from the ship into the churning clutches of the ocean.


	2. Killmonger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erik enters Death. Someone is waiting for him.

As Erik plunged into the sea, his soul was ripped from his body. He tried desperately to cling to his physical form, but it slipped through his ghost-like fingers and descended to its watery grave. His astral form sank as well, but was destined for a different crushing darkness than his corpse. 

He sank for what seemed like an eternity, until finally, the bottom of the ocean opened up with an unearthly howl. Erik, powerless to fight against the pull, crossed over into the next plane. 

He soon found himself in what seemed like a void. He could hear, see, and feel nothing but himself and a base beneath his feet. The silence was disorienting. He reached out his arms and felt nothing, not even air rushing past as he moved.

Was this the afterlife? Just maddening nothingness forever? Or was there somewhere else… someone else? If he started walking, he would never know what direction he was headed in, most likely taking him further away from wherever it was he needed to go. 

“Killmonger,” a voice whispered in his ear. Every hair on the back of his neck stood up and he whipped around in alarm. He threw his arms out in a defensive position but connected with nothing. It was dizzying. He was sure the voice had been right next to him.

“Killmonger,” it repeated in a hushed tone. Erik kept turning, unsure of his position in the darkness until he met a pair of glowing, white eyes. They stared at him, unblinking, following his every movement.

“Killmonger.”

“Killmonger?”

“Killmonger!” 

“He’s here.”

“He’s here!”

“Killmonger.”

More voices sounded and more eyes opened. The moniker rippled through the darkness, alerting more ominous stares to his presence. He was soon surrounded by hundreds, if not thousands of them. The eerie glow of their eyes illuminated their spectral figures. 

The whispers suddenly stopped and a stadium’s worth of stares bore down upon him. It seemed as if they were waiting for him to do something. Their complete stillness and silence had Erik on edge. He couldn’t properly assess if he was in danger or not. He had no way out. He didn’t even know if there was anywhere to go. 

“Who are you?” he finally asked, vying for information. He couldn’t tell if his voice was echoing or if the figures were repeating his own question back to him.

“Who are you?” he tried again, a little more forceful this time. 

One stepped forward.

“You don’t recognize us? Me?” 

Erik’s eyebrows knit together as he looked at the shape. He couldn’t identify any key features that would allow him to recognize to whom he was speaking. It was just a black, humanoid shape with deep, white eyes. He shook his head slightly.

It tilted its head and reached out. “How about now?”

Its hand closed around Erik’s wrist and with a flash of light, he was suddenly transported to an airplane junkyard in South Korea. 

“I’m sorry, Erik!” Linda gasped, pinned between Klaue’s shoulder and a handgun. Erik buried a bullet in her skull to simply get her out of the way. He had never planned on taking her with him. She was expendable. He could feel himself pull the trigger but he couldn’t stray from this series of events. It was set in stone. He couldn’t stop it even if he wanted to.

The image of Linda’s dead body faded as the shadow released its grip. While she was still shrouded in darkness, he could recognize her now. He looked past her and towards the crowd. Each shape looked faintly more human. He recognized some of them as people he had killed only hours before.

“I remember. Every single one of you,” Erik admitted. At his words, the ground beneath his feet began to rumble as his victims advanced on him. Like a well trained army, each form moved to its own place in line, snapping together like magnets. In two rows, they formed an endless hallway for Erik to follow.

“Walk,” Linda said.

Shrill wailing pierced Erik’s ears as each figure simultaneously relived their death at his hands. They reached out to touch him, forcing him to relive it too. Some of the spirits seemed at peace with their deaths and others cried and swore at him, gripping his wrist tighter and willing him to feel exactly what it was they experienced… what they lost.

“Wait wait wait wait wait!” a sweating American business man begged him, dropping from his office chair down to his knees. “I have a family. I have money! Whatever they’re paying you, I’ll double it. Trip-”

BANG.

His brains splattered across the windows of the corner office. 

Next, Erik was pulling the pin from a grenade to throw in a room full of unsuspecting Iraqi targets. Any survivors attempting to run were gunned down. It looked like a lot of other missions, the only distinction being the architecture.

Next came the unintended victims… what the military referred to as “collateral damage” during botched bombings or assassinations. They represented a large portion of the scars on Erik’s body and were most of the women and children on his list. The lives that were taken, but uncounted and unclaimed by those who’s fault it was. As part of a military machine, he felt he owned some of that fault, and if no one would take it, he would. He wasn’t completely heartless.

Erik endured flashbacks of fist fights, bombings, shootings, stabbings. He grappled with whether or not he felt guilty for all of the death he had wrought. As he walked, the people behind him faded away, off to wherever they rested in the afterlife. But after what felt like months of walking, Erik came face to face with someone he knew without a doubt he had absolutely qualms with killing.

Lance Corporal Webb. His first kill ever.

He was a slimy man who had joined the marines to “travel the world.” His aspirations were fueled by sexual tourism and young girls from Okinawa and Guam. 

Erik had become suspicious of Webb’s behavior and followed him once to an unlisted apartment in Naha. Erik waited outside until Webb left and broke in to the small flat. As the door opened, two small girls huddled together in a corner and cried, attempting to shield their bruised bodies from another assault. Erik tried to reassure the children that he was there to help as he cut away the binds, but they merely continued to sob, seeing only that he was yet another large man in an American military uniform. 

Before he could remove the girls, the door opened again. Webb stood there for a moment, shock on his face, before dropping the plastic shopping bags he’d been carrying and bolting out of the door.

Erik took off after him, seeing red. Webb had hardly made it down the hallway before Erik tackled and overpowered him. He sat on top of the other man’s chest and clasped his lethal hands around his throat. Webb scratched and punched at him in desperate attempts to loosen the grip, but Erik held on tighter, leaning his weight into it. Webb began to turn purple. His eyes bulged red while his feet kicked frantically. Just as quickly as it all began, he went still, and Erik had his first kill.

Erik was never charged for the murder. Seems the United States Military didn’t want an international pedophile as the poster boy for the armed forces. It was swept under the rug. Erik distinctly remembered his supervisor praising him in so many words, saying he “showed promise.”

Dead Webb stared at him in disgust, hints of strained red veins still visible around the edges of his white glowing eyes. It was now just the two of them in the darkness. No more wailing. No more whispering. 

“You turned out no better than me,” Webb croaked. The crushed trachea rattled, even in death. “I never killed anyone. But you killed thousands… Killmonger.” Webb spat the last word. His voice was tinged with jealousy. “They call you Killmonger. KILLMONGER?!”

“Fuck you,” Erik responded. He didn’t have the patience for the monologuing of a pedophile.

Webb seemed surprised. 

“You deserve to rot down here. And so do I.” Erik advanced on Webb with his hands out threateningly. Now he’d be the one to touch someone and remind them of their crimes.

“And if it’s just you and me, I will kill you with my bare hands over and over again for the rest of eternity. I will be your own personal hell.”

Webb stepped back, a very human fear driving him. Erik lunged forward, closing his hands around the already broken neck. His fingers slid right back in place like puzzle pieces. Webb gasped and fell backwards. 

Upon hitting the ground, Webb disappeared into a grey mist and Erik was thrown forward. 

It was the end of the line. There were no more victims to face.

The faint outline of a gate was visible now, but Erik hesitated. Through all of that reckoning with his victims, he still did not know where he was supposed to go and if he was headed in the right direction.

He stood and approached the dark archway. He felt a slight breeze against his skin. On it came a familiar scent that he couldn’t quite place. It beckoned him come closer.

This was a trap if he’d ever seen one.

He was just about to turn around when he heard a voice whisper through the veil.

“N’Jadaka?”


End file.
